How more and more women are turning entrepreneurs while managing family along the way

Women are also willing to change gears if need be to keep the venture alive.

Back in October 2016 when Ruchi Deepak was applying for an insurance licence to kick start her entrepreneurial journey, she had twins the same month. Looking after newborns, running the house did not deter her determination to co-start Acko General Insurance. The venture got a general insurance licence from the regulator IRDA in September 2017 and went live in December.

Early investors who have put in $30 million included Accel Partners, SAIF, Infosys founder NR Narayana Murthy and Rajeev Gupta, founder of Arpwood Capital. "The question of gender or raising twins never came up. The focus was always on business," recalls Deepak, 35, who worked at Franklin Templeton and other financial services companies before starting Acko.

In many ways Deepak’s entrepreneurial switch personifies the switch in the Indian startup landscape — there are more women-founded companies and investors are looking at merit of the business idea rather than overlook it because there is a woman founder or a co-founder. That apart, running a family is not coming in the way of starting companies.

Though Deepak, who hails from Jamshedpur and now based in Mumbai, does acknowledge that in her case experience of working with large companies helped. "Had I been in my 20s or without relevant experience, I may not have got the licence," she adds. Acko’s co-founder Varun Dua had earlier co-started Coverfox, an online insurance venture.

WOMEN VENTURES GAIN SCALEThere are more women starting companies. They are networking to give wings to their ventures and even dodging those cheeky WhatsApp messages for a date rather than a business discussion.

Indian Angel Network (IAN), one of the largest angel investor clubs in the country has seen ideas from women increase from 10% four years ago to 30% currently. LetsVenture, a Bengaluru-based platform for raising funds has seen 100% growth in women funded startups from a year-ago period, with one-fifth of the companies the platform has funded in the last 12 months having women founders or co-founders.

LetsVenture, co-founded by Shanti Mohan in 2013 now gets 600-700 ideas a month out of which 1% get funded. "There are more ideas by women. The market is neither discriminatory nor sympathetic to women founders. Neither are women looking for sympathy nor are they scared of failure. That’s a change. As for investors, they look at whether the idea is worth putting money on," says Mohan.

There are not only more companies founded by women, these are also in areas seen earlier as for men only — like stem cell research and drug trials and not just fashion or food ventures. Padmaja Ruparel, president, IAN says, "Investors look for ability to scale and whether the founders can sustain companies irrespective of the gender of the founder. That’s quite a shift from four years back, when women founders were frequently overlooked."

CATEGORY LEADERSOut of the eight unicorns in India, one has been co-founded by a woman. That’s ecommerce marketplace ShopClues, which has Radhika Aggarwal as a co-founder. Ace angel investor and Google India managing director Rajan Anandan says, "There are at least 30 women founded or co-founded startups which are category leaders."

For example Little Black Book is a leading local discovery app in the cities it offers services in. Delhi based SocialCops is a big data startup; Clovia co-started by Neha Kant is a big player in the lingerie space. Jaipurbased Hello English, is among Asia’s leading English learning apps; MobiKwik is the second largest mobile wallet startup in India. All of them have been founded or co-founded by women. Bengaluru-based GrowthStory co-founded by Meena Ganesh has four out of 12 ventures founded by women. That includes FreshMenu, a food delivery venture and Portea, a home healthcare services provider.

"There are enough investors in India who believe that men and women are equal. Now we need many more women entrepreneurs," adds Anandan. He believes women are more focused on building teams and companies, while men tend to engage in PR and fund raising. Besides, women keep their heads down in their businesses and anecdotally failure rate among women ventures is lower than among startups founded by men.

Anuradha Mittal, who worked at technology companies including IBM and Cisco before turning an angel investor believes the change in mindset (among investors and community at large) has come about as the ecosystem has evolved. "Yes, there are disruptions for women due to the ‘3M’ — marriage, maternity and motherhood. But at the same time there are professionally run crèches, women-friendly workplaces and changing attitudes that are contributing to a shift," says Mittal, who has invested in two startups, though both founded by men.

"I’m not averse to women-founded startups and will do if I come across a venture which I believe is a sound business that can scale. Also, having kids can impact work in the short term but increasingly investors are factoring in such disruptions and looking at the merits of the business," says Mittal.
NO MORE DOUBTFUL EYESWomen are also willing to change gears if need be to keep the venture alive. For example, Jaipur-based Culture Alley started in 2012 as a platform to learn multiple languages including Spanish and French. In 2014, the venture rebranded itself as Hello English and has 40 million people learning English on the app. That includes individuals and corporates who subscribe to its lessons for their staff. Corporate clients include Dominos, Wipro, Shoppers Stop and Relaxo Footwears.

Pranshu Bhandari, co-founder, Hello English says, "Today, the environment has changed for women entrepreneurs. Back in 2012 we used to see doubtful eyes. Though overall, women entrepreneurs are still small in number."

Besides, the change in environment is greater in big metro cities like Delhi, Mumbai or Bengaluru, while in places like Jaipur "women have just started coming out to work. Entrepreneurship should be next", adds Bhandari.

OFF DEALS & WHATSAPP DATES
Big data startup SocialCops co-founder Prukalpa Sankar says, "I’m not discriminated against when looking for business. If your product or service has merit, there will be business and that dosen’t depend on whether you can or cannot go out for a drink with potential customers or investors." While the change in the ecosystem is noticeable, few challenges persist. The number of women-founded companies has increased but is still small compared to those started by men. Of Nasscom’s 10,000 Startups, only 11% have been started by women. The angel investing community is still male dominated. Women find it difficult to network, build business relationships, getting customer leads and accessing talent.

"There are prejudices in investing, though I have not been a victim directly," adds Deepak.

"There can be that odd WhatsApp message which you have to deal with, besides running the company," says Sankar.

While women have started big data analytics companies, overall there are few examples of product companies or artificial intelligence or SaaS (software as a service) startups by women. And men overall score better in ability to raise money than women founders. But with more women entering the workforce now, the proportion of women turning entrepreneurs could also rise. "It is never going to be easy to manage both home and business — but those very qualities in multi-tasking make her better placed to cope with challenges," adds Mittal.

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